Project Eternity - $2M, Hardcore Stretch Goals

September 27th, 2012, 04:20

Project Eternity has passed $2M, unlocking player housing and the additional related content. Josh Sawyer has since posted a new update with a new $2.3M stretch goal tier that offers three different "hardcore" mode features, as well as some brief details on Godlike races. A partial snip:

Additionally, even among the ranks of RPG superfans, there exists a subset of players who can't get enough challenge. They want all of the difficulty features set to "I am pro." Collectively, we've worked on a bunch of these challenge modes in the past and enjoyed the results. Project Eternity seems like a very appropriate place to highlight suites of these difficulty options as distinct gameplay modes that players can opt-into at the beginning of any game. We've come up with three modes we'd like to support, which also includes the ability to turn many of their sub-features on and off on an individual level in an ordinary game: Expert Mode, Trial of Iron, and Path of the Damned.Expert Mode will disable all of the common ease-of-use / in-case-you-missed it gameplay elements like the display of skill thresholds, influence/reputation modifiers, and similar "helper" information. In a fashion similar to Fallout: New Vegas' Hardcore Mode, Expert Mode will also enable more punitive and demanding gameplay elements, in and out of combat. We're not saying we're going to have weighty gold (for real, we're not saying that), but if we did, you can bet that would be automatically turned on by Expert Mode.
If you guessed that Trial of Iron is like Temple of Elemental Evil's Ironman Mode, you guessed right. When you start a Trial of Iron game, you have one save game that persists for the entire campaign… or until you die. And if you die, your save game is deleted. Enjoy!Path of the Damned is a spiritual successor to Icewind Dale's Heart of Fury mode. In our encounters, we like to turn individual combatants on and off based on the level of difficulty. If you come into an area on Easy, maybe casters are replaced with weak melee enemies. If you come in on Hard, maybe the casters are augmented by a tough melee enemy or two. With Path of the Damned, that goes out the window. All enemies from all levels of difficulty are enabled and the combat mechanics are amplified to make battles much more brutal for everyone involved.
The first question you may have is, "Can I enable multiple challenge modes at once?" Yep, you sure can. They have to be selected at the beginning of the game, but if you want to play with two or all three at the same time, you can certainly can do so. If you're not quite sure you want all of the elements that come along with a given mode, this funding level will also cover implementing the ability to enable and disable the individual sub-features.

Not overly ecstatic with this stretch goal. Sure, there's people who enjoy turning their game into a chore, but I'd like to think that it's a niche group. And, for the record, "Path of the Damned" sounds nothing like a successor to ID's Heart of Fury mode. From what I recall, that was reserved for a second playthrough of the game; in this case, it's just a way to further pound your party into goo on the first run.

Give us more content, damnit, not a bunch of add-on party favors like companions and difficulty settings. Give me a lineup of abilities and spells to rival D&D's. Give me dungeons galore. Give me a richer backstory to the world, and ways to explore this lore.

All these updates just sound so shallow to me…too technical, not enough development of the main theme.

This update isn't just about hardcore modes. There is also playable Godlike races. As for the game modes, all the sub-options can be selected individually too. This mean you can play on the "normal" but select the "remove influence message" to not see how your choices affect your companions if you want. Basically a way of removing hand-holding if you don't want it.

Originally Posted by Drithius
Not overly ecstatic with this stretch goal. Sure, there's people who enjoy turning their game into a chore, but I'd like to think that it's a niche group. And, for the record, "Path of the Damned" sounds nothing like a successor to ID's Heart of Fury mode. From what I recall, that was reserved for a second playthrough of the game; in this case, it's just a way to further pound your party into goo on the first run.

Give us more content, damnit, not a bunch of add-on party favors like companions and difficulty settings. Give me a lineup of abilities and spells to rival D&D's. Give me dungeons galore. Give me a richer backstory to the world, and ways to explore this lore.

All these updates just sound so shallow to me…too technical, not enough development of the main theme.

But then you run the risk of 'box bullet points', where games used to list bullet points of what they had in the back of the box… "4 races! 6 classes! 120 weapons! 60 monsters! 20 dungeons!" but then you get the game and it means nothing, races are just skins, classes are just different stat sets, weapons same thing, monsters that are the same with a few different colored pixels, copy/paste dungeons, etc.
I'd say they should just leave it as it is. After all, gotta leave something for the sequels! or you'll end up adding a panda race.

Originally Posted by Avantenor
I guess there is so much still work in progress regarding the lore, the story and content that they can not wrap it up into a nice story.

Hardcore modes gave it actually a boost in pledges. Some minutes after announcing there was a third 10.000 $ pledge.

Hmm. Who has the money to do that? It remains to be seen if those actually get paid.

Originally Posted by Drithius
Not overly ecstatic with this stretch goal. Sure, there's people who enjoy turning their game into a chore, but I'd like to think that it's a niche group. And, for the record, "Path of the Damned" sounds nothing like a successor to ID's Heart of Fury mode. From what I recall, that was reserved for a second playthrough of the game; in this case, it's just a way to further pound your party into goo on the first run.

Give us more content, damnit, not a bunch of add-on party favors like companions and difficulty settings. Give me a lineup of abilities and spells to rival D&D's. Give me dungeons galore. Give me a richer backstory to the world, and ways to explore this lore.

All these updates just sound so shallow to me…too technical, not enough development of the main theme.

The people donating to the startup are more likely to be hard-core gamers, so they're part of the group being targeted by these modes. But seriously, why wouldn't you appreciate the ability to tune the game to your playing preferences? It also adds to the enjoyment of replay by adding back challenge where it has been removed due to familiarity with the game. I'd say it's a winner.

Originally Posted by booboo
I've pretty much approved of all the stretch goals - I'm wondering whether they will reach $2.5 mill… and what other goals they may add if they unexpectedly have a lot more cash flowing in

They will.In most kickstarter I seen last 3 days are as good or better than first 3.My prediction they will end up somewhere between 3.3 and 3.5 million $.

Originally Posted by Drithius
Not overly ecstatic with this stretch goal. Sure, there's people who enjoy turning their game into a chore, but I'd like to think that it's a niche group. And, for the record, "Path of the Damned" sounds nothing like a successor to ID's Heart of Fury mode. From what I recall, that was reserved for a second playthrough of the game; in this case, it's just a way to further pound your party into goo on the first run.

Give us more content, damnit, not a bunch of add-on party favors like companions and difficulty settings. Give me a lineup of abilities and spells to rival D&D's. Give me dungeons galore. Give me a richer backstory to the world, and ways to explore this lore.

All these updates just sound so shallow to me…too technical, not enough development of the main theme.

Originally Posted by booboo
I've pretty much approved of all the stretch goals - I'm wondering whether they will reach $2.5 mill… and what other goals they may add if they unexpectedly have a lot more cash flowing in

Project Eternity daily pledges total is a bit faster than Double Fine Adventures did. It reached 2 millions almost a full day earlier than DFA.

DFA is the most pledged (and backed) games currently on Kickstarter with 3.3 millions. PE should beat it following all the other successful Kickstarter projects trend.

Originally Posted by crpgnut
If I donated $10,000 to a game, I'd be forever banned to the doghouse. I haven't donated yet, but I was thinking $140-250. I need to read through the tiers again and stop procrastinating.

I suggest you check the pictures on the home page of the project. The text can't be updated (unless you bug Kickstarter).

In my opinion, it wouldn't make sense of them to propose super mega content update every 200k like some people are suggesting/wanting. It wouldn't be viable. I suppose they could skip the in between "levels" and just do a big content update every 500k lets say…but they have to keep the funds coming in and to keep people motivated toward goals that can be reached.

So it makes sense to insert smaller goals that can broaden your audience in between the "big content" pledge levels and it allows them to not make it seem impossible to reach that next step.

Thats how I see it anyway, and besides I like anything that will allow me to replay the game and find it challenging.